One Serving of Crusty Old Man
by reinadefuego
Summary: There isn't an easy fix for screwed-up old men like Barney. Barney/Lee.


_"Run, you bastard!"_

 _The concrete cracks beneath his feet and dust clouds billow out from the collapsing building as he runs. It shudders and shifts under him as the support pillars and walls begin to give way, and millimetre by millimetre the building itself begins to fall towards the earth. Ahead of him, the helicopter hovers in position and all Barney can do is keep moving. If he jumps short, he's dead. If his legs don't work properly, he's dead._

 _And if he doesn't get this stupid vengeful idiot off that goddamn prison train, Barney's going to shoot Lee himself._

 _"Christmas!"_

Barney opened his eyes and squinted at the window, splaying his fingers over his eyes and trying his best to block out the sun. His heart pounded in his chest, and despite his calm outward appearance, his mind was running in circles trying to remember just where the hell he was and what he was doing there.

"Christmas?" he called out. Someone had pulled the alarm out of its socket and let him sleep in. That was never a good thing, and these recurring nightmares — they came at all hours of the night and occurred every other day — proved it. "Lee!"

He almost cracked the drywall as Lee flung the door open and barged into Barney's room with two knives in hand. The tone of his voice was off. Something was wrong (Barney's use of his given name notwithstanding) and it triggered that switch in Lee's mind that managed his protective instincts.

The noise of the knob hitting the wall was more like a gunshot than a bang. It was certainly loud enough to draw Barney's attention, and with it the attention of his trigger finger. Barney drew his revolver from under his pillow and had it trained on Lee by the time he stopped the door from bouncing back at him.

"What's going on?" Lee asked, looking around the room. Curtains open and windows intact, no sign of anyone posing a threat, yet Barney's voice and the look in his eyes said something had rattled him. "I thought—"

 _Holy shit._ Barney lowered his revolver and moved his finger off the trigger guard. That was one hell of a response. "Uh, yeah," he said, trying to think of something to say that wouldn't make him sound like some young and immature jarhead. "It was just a bad dream. Left me disoriented."

Oh thank God. Lee let out a sigh of relief and tucked his knives into his pockets. From where he stood, he could've taken an intruder out in seconds flat (and would've without hesitation if the situation called for it). He didn't like it when the job followed them home, but shit happened and there was always that chance, that risk the work they did would bite them in the arse; Lee had been prepared for another Stonebanks-like scenario for years now. "You want to talk about it over lunch? Tool's been making gumbo."

Sounded good to him. Barney nodded and pushed himself up to a sitting position, then eased his aching creaky body off the bed. He staggered towards the door and Lee, and didn't even think twice about it when Christmas slung his arm around Barney's shoulders.

Had anyone else come barging into the room, the conversation might've turned out awkward. Toll Road would've told him to get therapy, Gunnar wouldn't have said anything and just stood in the doorway like a fucking asshole, and Tool—

Tool would just act like this was nothing new (because it was) and give him a cup of coffee. They both had dreams, bad memories, and they couldn't do shit about getting rid of them. Focusing on the positives seemed to work for Tool as a distraction technique, but Barney's mind just kept circling around to Azmenistan and that casino complex.

His head felt heavy and sluggish, arms hanging from his shoulders like stiff useless branches, so Barney allowed himself to be guided into the kitchen wherein Tool stood at the table, dishing out rice and beans and mouthwatering spicy gumbo.

"Hey, brother, you're just in time." Tool smiled and shoved two hefty bowls of food towards him. "Eat up."

"Thanks." Barney glanced at Lee but he didn't say anything. Christmas was one of the few who didn't dance around the subject of trauma and just how messed up they were, and his silence — as Barney had come to learn — was nothing less than a sign of respect. He never pushed anyone to talk, just sat and waited till they were good and ready.

Once the others collected their bowls, Gunnar and his girlfriend crept out from the shadows, took their lunch and retreated to those same shadows without so much as a 'hello', Tool went downstairs, and Barney shifted his seat a half-inch closer to Lee's.

"It was Stonebanks again, wasn't it?" Lee said, broaching the subject with as much tact as it could be afforded. He didn't like people prying into his life and his mind, and Lee knew Barney well enough to know if Barney wasn't prepared to talk then he wouldn't.

Hot food, a still-warm kitchen, and Lee next to him: this was what he'd imagined when his mom told him he'd settle down one day. Too bad it wouldn't last. Two divorces later, Barney had no interest in getting married again. "I wish…"

He could deal with dreams of Stonebanks. They were about revenge and pain, not loss. Conrad Stonebanks was dead and could never hurt him again, but these dreams were different. He was tired of losing his friends, his family; every time Barney thought he'd moved past his fears, his subconscious pulled this shit and dredged it all up again like a bad DTV movie he'd filmed and subsequently wanted to forget.

"It was you," Barney said, finally, forking a piece of sausage and shoving it in his mouth. He chewed and swallowed, savouring the chilli-induced burn and the warmth as it slid down through his body. Spicy gumbo on a crappy day was just about the best thing there was in life, cake, music, and hot coffee not withstanding. "My memories got blurred up…"

Lee gave him a concerning glance but said nothing. For Barney to talk about what was going on inside that brain of his required timing and patience, two things which Lee had mastered over the past several years of his being on the team.

"Dreamt you were Doc." He poked at his lunch, eyes and head down, focused on distracting himself from the arduous task of speaking his mind. "And I was back on the rooftop of that casino in Azmenistan."

So it was indirectly related to Stonebanks, Lee decided. Ever since Barney had shot him that day — no body armour this time, arsehole, Lee thought smugly — he'd been a changed man. It was as if everything Barney had overcome since the 90s had returned to destroy his life.

"Feel better now?"

Barney rolled his eyes. "No. Don't suppose you're gonna get off your ass and offer me a beer?"

It'd be nice for Barney if he did, wouldn't it? "I don't suppose you're going to say 'please'?"

"Will sugar on top help my case any?"

It was moments like this that reminded him Barney Ross was in fact a demented bastard. Lee stood and fetched two cold bottles from the fridge, setting one down in front of Barney and cracking the other open for himself. "So is this a pity party, a drunken gathering, or a wake for your sanity?"

Barney glared at him over the neck of his beer. "I keep dreaming I lose you, and I don't know why I'm so afraid of that," he said, then gulped down half his bottle in seconds. He also didn't know the answer to Lee's question and that was a problem in and of itself. "I can't—"

He couldn't lose another teammate. Not in the field, not on a mission, and not to a bullet. Stonebanks had almost cost him Caesar, and Vilain had taken Billy from him before Barney could even say goodbye.

What Barney suspected he was really thinking was: I can't lose _you_. I can't lose my _partner_. Stonebanks had turned into a psychopath (although a piece of him suspected he'd known Conrad was one all along), Trench had gone solo, and Tool was retired. All his former brothers in arms had left the mercenary life one way or another and now the only person Barney had left who could put up with his black-hearted self-destructive attitude was Lee.

"Can't understand why you care so much when we've all got a tattoo that says 'expendable'?" Lee offered.

"Sure." And don't say I'm a demented bastard, Barney thought, you always say that. "Something like that."

Lee drained the last few drops of his beer, scraped the remaining grains of rice into his mouth, and put the glass in the recycling box. Perhaps Barney was just lonely, or he'd finally succumbed to the realisation he _did_ care if he died. "Well I don't want to lose you either, you ugly bastard."

 _That's not an improvement, Christmas._ He pushed his chair back and stood, took their dishes to the sink and mindlessly rinsed them off before shoving them in the dishwasher.

"What else?" Lee asked, palming another beer off to Barney before he could say 'no'. Everyone worried about Barney too, certainly just as much as he did for them, but none of them could ever figure out the 'right' way to approach him. Barney was a black hole that sucked everything in and spat something out only once every billion years.

"Lee—"

"You were awake half the night, Barney." Don't pry, he told himself, you always said you wouldn't pry without an invitation. Lee against the counter where Barney still stood and placed one hand on his shoulder. "You're not Gunnar, or Toll Road."

"I'm fine." And with that, his walls were instantly rebuilt. This little therapy session or whatever Lee wanted it to be was over. He didn't need Christmas or anyone else for that matter poking around in his brain, with or without his permission. Barney left his beer on the counter unopened and turned around as if to leave. "I feel better, don't you?"

"No. You need—"

Barney hooked one of Lee's belt loops and pulled him close till Lee was almost flush against him and he could smell that lingering hint of aftershave. They weren't married for crying out loud, so why did he care so much? This was only an arrangement that benefited them both without the issue of making it complicated. "What I need is you."

"Then talk to me."

"After," Barney said. The underlying bite in his voice said this was the last time Barney was going to try and argue with Lee. "We'll talk _after_ you fuck me."

"It's the middle of the—"

He rolled his eyes and lifted his keys from his pocket with his free hand. He hadn't said anything about doing it here, and in a small hangar an hour's drive away was an empty plane just waiting for someone to board it. "At least I'm not sabotaging my life," Barney said, keeping his voice low. "I don't know any other way of living, and you _know_ that. Can we not do this right now, Christmas, please?"

Fine. They'd talk after, and whether Barney liked it or not, they'd put all his shit on the table.

* * *

Barney was pretty sure he'd fucked his way into Lee's little black book by the time they collapsed on the canvas seating. With Lee still half inside him, one arm around his chest, and Barney's legs hitched up around Lee's hips, he never wanted to move again. Face pressed against the hollow of Lee's shoulder, he let the smell of body odour and spunk leave him hovering on the brink of unconsciousness.

He was also pretty sure that when he did get up and start walking around again, it'd be painful. Something in his back had seized. His body was reminding him of his age and that he shouldn't try to keep up with Lee, but Barney just couldn't help himself sometimes.

"Feel better now?" Lee said into the base of Barney's neck. He reached up and ran his fingers through Barney's short black hair then followed the thick muscles of his neck down to his shoulders. He massaged circles with his thumb against Barney's shoulder joint, thinking about nothing but soothing that unconscious pain. "We've still gotta have that talk."

His hips ached too. Everything probably would if he listened to his muscles, but Barney had never been one to acknowledge his body's limits. He shook his head slightly and said nothing. Maybe he felt better, maybe he felt a little worse. It was hard to tell when you'd broken so many bones and dislocated multiple joints.

"Later," Barney reminded him, and lifted his head to look down at Lee. "And yeah…kinda."

That was good enough for him, Lee decided. He eased himself out of Barney then slid up so they were face to face and kissed him once more to remind himself this had happened.

There was safety in Lee's arms. A dream-quelling tranquility he'd never experienced with anyone else too. The warmth of Lee's body lulled him to sleep after a while, rendering him silent for as long as he remained unconscious.

The few hours they'd carved out for themselves this afternoon would pay off, Lee hoped. There wasn't an easy fix for fucked up old men like Barney, nor any kind of quick solution that could be applied to someone's fears. Despite all his reassurances, it seemed there was still a long way to go until Barney's brain settled down and realised Lee wasn't going anywhere.

"You can't get rid of me that easily," Lee murmured once Barney was deep asleep. Despite his attitude and the bullshit that came with it, he would never trade his life with Barney for anything. He'd also never try to change the man who'd taken one look at his damaged arse all those years ago and asked him why he wasn't on the plane already. "Sleep tight, you miserable bastard."

As if on autopilot, Barney pressed himself closer to Lee without another word and quietly said, "I heard that."


End file.
